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"Winter" has finally arrived in Dubai.

The kind of season that invites you outside, where the air is crisp, and the world feels a little quieter.

Tonight, I decided to spend some time in my backyard. For the first time this season, I lit a candle and sat down, letting its flickering flame keep me company, casting strange little shadows around.

It's funny, isn't it?

How a tiny flame can bring so much clarity.

We spend our lives bathing in the fluorescent glow of progress. Screens, bulbs, LED strips. So much light, yet often so little illumination.

The candlelight felt... honest.

I could hear the silence more clearly. A rare, almost forgotten stillness. The sort of stillness where you could hear your own thoughts, not the thoughts you’re supposed to think.

It took sitting outside for me to see what I was missing.

It's ironic.

We chase bigger, better, faster, more. The latest gadgets. The latest apps. Things to make our lives convenient. Efficient. We are busy, after all.

But in this moment, there was no efficiency to chase. No messages to respond to. No notifications to acknowledge. Just me, a candle, and a profound sense of simplicity.

If marketing has taught me anything, it’s that people crave what they don’t have. We want to feel something real. Something that connects.

But maybe, the real connection isn’t always found in the latest trend or shiny new campaign. Maybe, it's found in these silent moments, the ones without a hashtag, the ones that don't fit into a 15-second clip.

The irony of it all—to reconnect, we sometimes need to disconnect.

The candle flickered again, and I found myself smiling.

Not because of any grand realization.

But because in that dim, imperfect light, life felt a little more alive.

Sometimes, a bit of candlelight is all we need to find our way back.

How AI perceived a candlelit evening in my backyard, not bad!

(𝘐𝘮𝘢𝘨𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘈𝘐 𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥)